


Drink the Day

by kla1991



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-10
Updated: 2014-07-21
Packaged: 2018-02-04 03:05:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1763675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kla1991/pseuds/kla1991
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was a certain tangible air quality that Myka had learned to sense. It was like the pressure between two magnets being forced together at the wrong poles, in that moment before one of them flipped and closed the distance... Usually it lasted longer than this. But in the split instant after Myka felt the pressure and before she could break it, Helena was kissing her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Age of Innocence

            Pete meant well. Really, he did. He and Helena had been working side by side all day with neither incident nor need of intervention, and Myka even felt safe letting them sit beside each other on the airplane while she took the window seat next to a dozing man with tattoos and a beat-up copy of _The House of Mirth_. But then Pete stepped in it.

            “Those were some killer moves you whipped out today,” he said. “You’re really spry for an old girl.”

            “Somewhere underneath the jest and colloquialism, I believe there was buried a compliment.”

            Pete laughed. “Yeah, it was impressive. I’m not much for history, you know, but it’s good to know there was at least one interesting lady back then.”

            Helena froze, and Myka squirmed in her seat.

            “What do you mean by that?” Helena asked.

            “Well, nowadays you can find a girl to talk to about just about anything: sports, TV, comic books, even girls! Back in the 1800’s, it was all dresses and dinners and girl stuff. I mean, it must have been kinda boring, for…”

            “Agent Lattimer, the fact that my skill set is considered male does not in any way make it more interesting or worthy of attention. I knew a woman in my day, a housewife consumed by society and homemaking and ‘girl stuff,’ as you so elegantly put it, who was so perfectly attuned to social cues and practices, so adept at reading the people around her, that she was functionally psychic. And I assure you, Mister Lattimer, she wielded her power like a warrior and an artist. So insult me and my time period as you will, but do not _ever_ insult the women of my day!”

            After Helena’s rant reached a certain volume, Myka had reached between the seats and put a hand on her arm, but while Helena had concluded in a harsh whisper, she refused to be stopped. Really, Myka hadn’t wanted her to.

            Pete kept his mouth shut for the entire flight, and only spoke to Myka in the car. She wasn’t expecting his screw-up, which had made Helena quiet and distant, to be something she was grateful for.

           

 

            “Who was she?” Myka asked later. “The woman who was psychic. How did you know her?”

            The two of them had retired to the quiet of Myka’s bedroom to read. Myka was settled on her little couch, watching Helena skim the overflowing bookshelf for something to start in on. Helena smiled a little.

            “Her name was Nettie, and we were lovers.”

            In the silence that followed, Helena pulled a book loose with two elegant fingers, flipped it open in her hands, and stood reading for a moment. Then she settled on the couch and began searching for the first page; she didn’t look up as she murmured, “I was given to understand that such things were more acceptable these days.”

            Myka grinned. “In most circles, yeah. Sorry, I was just…” She picked her way through words, searching for ones at once approving and innocent. “It was sweet.”

            Helena gave her a half smile and turned the page of her book. Myka convinced herself that she was seeing Helena in some sort of new way, and so it was perfectly fine to look at her for a moment. Of course, being bisexual changed nothing about Helena; it wasn’t even surprising, really. There was a shamelessness in the way she’d pressed into Myka’s space, challenged her resolve and stared her down until Myka couldn’t move forward without looking away, strategies at least partially designed to hit at sexual weakness. And Helena had never questioned that the appeal would work as well on Myka as it had on Pete. Rather than coming off as a ploy, though, Helena’s confidence was ultimately just acknowledgement of a fact: she was staggeringly sexy.

            And Myka was staring.

            Helena turned another page, and Myka rubbed the back of her neck and wondered if telling herself “no” would work any better with this woman than it had with Sam. The mystery of Helena’s sexual preferences had been helping, but with that gone, there was only the usual disbelief that anyone would want her. Sam had worked hard to disabuse her of that assumption, and now that she needed it, it wasn’t as firm as it used to be.

            After all, Helena was here with her instead of tinkering with Claudia, working at the Warehouse, or reading alone. Helena had sought her out in good times and bad, even when the risk was enormous, just to see her.

            She was looking again, and Helena’s eyes weren’t moving across the page.

            “What are you thinking about?”

            “Girls,” Myka replied, and Helena laughed. It was worth all the risk that quip had entailed to hear Helena do that. And what came after that sound didn’t matter; Myka remembered how much it had meant to her in high school, just finding other girls like her. Helena had been alone for so long.

            “Are you implying, Agent Bering,” Helena asked, “that you’ve tipped the velvet in your time?”

            “See, I know what that phrase means, but what is it talking about? What’s the etymology?”

            “It compares a woman’s tongue to an old velvet hat.”

            Myka shifted on the couch to give Helena her full attention, and in the process, moved distractingly close to her. It was an interesting experience, she thought, to be invading Helena’s space instead of vice versa. Helena didn’t seem to notice, though, or care; she was watching Myka’s face, eyebrow raised, as if waiting for her to get the punch line of a joke.

            “But where’s the connection? What do hats have to do with kissing?” Myka asked.

            Helena shrugged. “What does baseball have to do with petting parties?”

            “Petting par…” Myka shook her head and sighed. “Never mind.”

            “A well-loved velvet hat is touched often, darling, as should a woman’s tongue with one’s own, or with more intimate regions.” Helena smirked. “Not the most transparent connection, perhaps, but quite a vivid one. Now, as to your feminine train of thought…”

            “Yes. I’m… uh,” Myka hesitated a moment, uncertain where to begin. It occurred to her then how old Helena really was, how far removed she was from modern sexuality. Not as far removed as she could have been, obviously, and Victorians weren’t as prudish as people thought, but still.

            Helena’s eyes narrowed, as if she could see what was making Myka stall if she squinted. But she waited.

            “I’m pansexual. Pan being all.”

            “And ‘all’ implying more than two.”

            Tracy, Myka’s sister, had the power to verbally roll her eyes. Disdain could be heard, seen, even felt in the air if you could read the human body as automatically as Myka could. And Myka had had this conversation with people like her sister.

            Helena’s mouth was slightly open, her eyes were fixed. The air between them stirred as she leaned, almost imperceptibly, forward. She was curious.

            “Yeah, I mean, when is there ever really just two of something? Biology is way more complicated than that, even on a chromosomal level, and then when you add neurology and psychology…”

            “The possibilities are nearly endless,” Helena sighed. “I had an odd experience early on in my exploration of biology. There was a mouse, ostensibly male, but when I looked inside the body, I…”

            Myka threw her hands up, declaring, “Stop! No, no dead animals. My first dissection, I puked on my lab partner.”

            “But you considered being a doctor!” Helena protested, “How can you not…”

            “People are different. There are regulations and consent forms, and animals don’t get that. No dead animals.”

            “Righty-ho, then,” Helena winced. The apologetic touch of her fingers on Myka’s thigh was so brief Myka couldn’t respond before it was over. “So tell me more about these genders.”

            For a while, Helena was so engaged with this that sexuality seemed to have shifted out of focus entirely. But then she asked, “And is your pansexuality applied or only theoretical?”

            “More or less applied.”

            “And what, pray tell, was your most enjoyable application?”

            Myka nudged Helena with her foot, laughing, “I think I’ve shared enough for an evening. How about a little quid pro quo?”

            Her foot was still on Helena’s thigh, and Myka refused to move it or look away. Maybe if she pushed against that goddamn wall of sexual energy Helena built up when she wanted to control a situation, she could actually find her footing with the woman.

            After a moment, Helena shoved Myka’s foot away and scoffed.

            “You want to know about my most pleasurable romp, do you?”

            “No,” Myka said. “I want to know about your most embarrassing one.”

            Helena tried to glare without laughing; failing that, she shook her head and looked away.

            “That would be with my Nettie. She had warned me upon arrival that she was quite engaged with her duties, answering mail, planning a party at the house, an endless list of things, and she couldn’t possibly waste a moment alone with me. I assured her I could behave myself, and so she let me sit on her writing desk. And under her desk. I’d worked my way entirely under her skirts without reproach when a maid came in. My darling girl, as promised, carried on her business with the woman without a thought for me, stifling under all that cloth. Absurd, the whole ordeal. I couldn’t move an inch for fear of rustling her skirts. It was so bloody hot, I ended up with a bead of sweat simply torturing the end of my nose. And dear god, she smelled wondrous, but there was nothing to be done for that, either. I’ve served eight years as a Warehouse agent, and I have never in my life had so much soreness in my muscles. I was stuck there for twenty minutes, at least! I nearly suffocated, truly I did, and all Nettie ever said of it was that it served me right.”

            Myka was in hysterics, and when Helena tried to look her in the eye, she dissolved as well. She clapped a hand to Myka’s shoulder, as if clutching to her would help the two of them breathe.

            “I can’t decide if that’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard,” Myka finally wheezed, “or if it’s just way too late at night.”

            “And is it really so terribly late, or are you trying to weasel out of reciprocation?” Helena teased.

            Her fingers wandered from Myka’s shoulder to the ends of her hair, tugging on a curl and watching it spring when she released it. The mirth in her face gave way to a fascination that made Myka stare, again. When Helena looked at her, the affection was so unexpected that Myka almost started laughing again. Helena giggled, and Myka pointed at the clock across the room.

            “It’s definitely late.”

            “Then I shan’t keep you,” Helena said.

            She closed her book and slipped it back on the shelf. Myka stood beside her open door, hands in her back pockets.

            “Good night,” she said.

            There was a certain tangible air quality that Myka had learned to sense. It was like the pressure between two magnets being forced together at the wrong poles, in that moment before one of them flipped and closed the distance.

            Usually it lasted longer than this. But in the split instant after Myka felt the pressure and before she could break it, Helena was kissing her. And Myka was so focused on how, exactly, that was really happening that she missed it.

            “Good night,” Helena whispered, and Myka felt it on her lips like an echo.

            Helena walked across the hallway toward her room, and Myka was damned if she would miss anything else about her. She watched every step, every motion it took for Helena to grip the door handle to her bedroom, turn it, and slip inside. She saw Helena’s hands shutting the door as gingerly as possible, to avoid making any noise at this late hour.

            And she saw Helena’s sheepish smile, the glance she threw across the hall before the door clicked shut.

           

 

            “So what was that about?” Myka asked the next morning.

            Helena tugged the protective mask off her face and gestured widely with the FISH fixer, that enormous baton Artie had been wielding on Myka’s first day here. “It’s a beautiful day. Don’t you wish we could spend all our time out in this weather instead of indoors?”

            Myka’s gaze swept the Badlands, red and jagged under a perfectly blue sky, and really, Helena was right.

            She was also a menace with that FISH fixer. Myka dodged it for the third time in five minutes and snatched it out of Helena’s hands. It pulsed and hummed when she settled it over her shoulder, and the glass cylinder gave off heat next to Myka’s ear. The large disk near the top rattled a bit. Helena had claimed she could repair that, but it probably wouldn’t need repairing if she would stop waving it around. It was delicate, and cranky. They’d spent half an hour holding the loose pieces just so, begging it to work.

            “Don’t change the subject,” Myka scolded.

            Helena sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “I take it you’re referring to that kiss I gave you.”

            Myka didn’t answer. This wasn’t going well, and from the guilty look on her face, Myka guessed Helena knew that, too.

            “I’m sorry, Myka. Recklessness is not one of my shining aspects.”

            “So it was a mistake?”

            Helena was twisting her work gloves in one hand and her locket in the other when she repeated, “I’m sorry.”

            Something was wrong.

            But Helena was at the door to the Warehouse in an instant, sweeping down the umbilicus into Artie’s office. Myka barely kept up with her.

            “Could I get the schematics for this fixer?” Helena asked Artie. “Something’s off with it, I’d like to take a look.”

            Artie opened his mouth to argue, but Myka interrupted, suggesting, “They’d be in the library, right? I mean, there isn’t an aisle for the FISH like there is for Farnsworths.”

            “The two of you may have a look _together,_ ” Artie growled. “And if you break it…”

            “I built a time machine!” Helena exclaimed. “I think I can manage this.”

            For a moment, Myka looked back and forth between them and tried to imagine any possible way to intervene. But then Artie shrugged.

            “Fair enough. Go, fix.”

            Helena softened, too, once Artie had turned his back to them. She thanked him almost gently before striding out of the office.

 

 

            Deep in the stacks on the East side of the Warehouse, between the inventions of Nicola Tesla and the early designs of Ada Lovelace, was the H. G. Wells section. Helena had built a little workshop among the shelves; ladders made of old planks and spare brackets led to scattered bins of brass nuts and bolts, slots filled with sheet metal and glass, and two stories of peg board adorned with tools both new and old. A long orange extension cord snaked its way up from the ground floor to the precariously narrow shelf that housed Helena’s worktable, one half of a desk that had once been in the Bed and Breakfast, before an artifact mishap had incinerated the back.

            Helena unrolled the blue prints for the FISH fixer, ran her fingers along the silvered lines on the page, then called Myka over to help her pin it to a cork board in front of the work table.

            “Let’s have a look at you, then,” she muttered when the device itself was on the table before her. She pulled a swing arm lamp over the device, then began running her hands along the shaft, searching for the lever that would open the casing.

            Myka clung to the upright of a nearby shelf as subtly as she could. The whole structure shook when Helena strode across it, gathering tools and a roll of copper wire. It was terrifying, but she had been ordered to watch, and she might be helpful, as long as she could help while still clinging to the upright, and Helena wouldn’t bring her up here if it weren’t safe, right?

            In answer to her unasked question, Helena clipped a carbineer to Myka’s belt as she passed, then nodded up to where it was tied off to the shelf above her. It wasn’t ideal, of course, but it was still comforting. Myka gave the rope a tug, then followed Helena freely across the narrow workspace to the desk.

            “And you’re not wearing something like this, why?”            

            Helena shrugged. “I’m not afraid.”

            “Reckless,” Myka muttered. “Right.”

            After a few minutes, Helena waved her closer and pointed at the guts of the FISH fixer. Piece by piece, she walked Myka through it, tracing her finger along the blueprint, then pulling apart the physical bits, revealing all the little loosenings that had appeared over the years. She started then to propose the minor improvisations to hold them more firmly in place. She sketched as she talked, with an other-worldly precision of line and angle. An hour of drawing, some inventing, some tinkering, and only a few curses later, the work was nearly done. When she handed the tools to Myka and stepped aside, her instructions were enough to guide Myka through the last of the repairs. Helena stepped close when Myka declared herself finished, hummed approval, then snapped the FISH fixer closed.

            “Good job!”

            Helena was streaked with machine oil and beaming. And she was painfully close.

            “Why was it a mistake?” Myka asked, and Helena put a grease-stained hand to her face and groaned.

            “Because, Myka, when I kissed you last night, I hadn’t thought it through, and I don’t think you have, either. I know what I am to you. My books on your bookshelf, so well loved. I won’t hold up to your visions of me.”

            The sentiment was so absurd that for a moment all Myka could do was stare. Only Helena, she thought, with her peculiar brand of ego and self-deprecating mistrust, could accuse her of hero worship and school-girl crushes.

            “That is ridiculous!” she finally laughed. “Helena, I’ve watched you brush your teeth and sneeze and almost blow up a microwave. I’m pretty sure you’re human.”

            Helena frowned. “What does my sneezing have to do with anything?”

            “You do it every time you go out in the sun, and always in prime numbers. _And,_ the only reason you can sneeze seven times in a row is because they’re the tiniest mouse sneezes I’ve ever heard.”

            Myka was grinning, but Helena looked torn. She sank down onto the floor of her workspace, feet dangling over the edge; Myka’s rope was too short to join her, and she couldn’t see Helena’s face.

            “I still haven’t thought this through. I can’t…” Helena ran a hand through her hair and sighed. Her words came out in clumsy chunks of phrase, a bit too slow to stick together the way they should have. “I can’t have this changing anything. Our friendship, the truce I’ve made with Artie, these are not things I wish to trifle with. But there were times, before, when I could be waylaid on occasion. Some of the best days I remember were the ones when Christina would come dashing in calling, ‘Mummy, Mummy!’ and botch my entire schedule. It never did much harm, and she was always so happy.”

            Somewhere in the middle of her speech, she had started to cry. Myka unclipped herself from the rope and sat gingerly beside Helena at the edge of the plank. The drop made her stomach turn, and no power on earth could compel her to release her death grip on the ledge, but she managed to edge her hand to the side until it overlapped Helena’s.

            “Sounds worth it to me,” she said.

            Helena wiped her face with her free hand and looked to Myka, waiting for something more.

            “I don’t usually play fast and loose with friends,” Myka continued, “but if that’s what you need, I get that. Seems like a fair compromise, anyway. I mean, if my choice is some or nothing…”

            “That seems a bit risky for your usual taste,” Helena said.

            Myka shrugged. “What can I say? You’re a terrible influence.”

            She kissed Helena’s cheek and started making her way down the rickety ladder to the floor. By the time they were both on the ground, Helena was smiling again, and her sense of personal space seemed to have been left behind on the workbench.

           

 

            They agreed to hold back as often as possible, and move slowly; Myka knew without asking that this would give Helena time to think, adjust, decide. She would have had more time, of course, if they had been better at keeping their hands to themselves.

            It started the night of their agreement, when they knocked their teeth together in the middle of a kiss.

            “We are seriously out of practice,” Myka had grumbled, and Helena had suggested that there were wonderful ways of fixing that. They had fixed it by the time they went to bed.

            A week later, they were spending another quiet evening on Myka’s bedroom couch. Myka was straddling Helena’s lap, pulling her head back by the hair, and biting her neck behind the hinge of her jaw. Helena’s uneven fingernails scraped along Myka’s jeans. When Myka ran her fingers down Helena’s chest to the limit of her shirt, Helena’s leg twitched; Myka grinned and nipped Helena’s ear, reveling in the fact that Helena was struggling as much as she was to keep her hips still. She pulled Helena forward by her shirt, pressing the woman against her body and keeping her head held back; the height difference from this position was considerable, and the angle she had to maintain in Helena’s neck in order to kiss her was drastic. She released Helena’s hair after a moment, and Helena immediately pressed her lips to Myka’s collarbones. Her fingers crept along the hem of Myka’s shirt. Myka guided them under and along her sides. The touch made her relax, pushing Helena back into the couch.

            Her hand slid down from Helena’s shoulder, Helena ran her nails up Myka’s back, and Helena’s breast was under Myka’s palm before either of them could think. It sunk in slowly, and reason fought with natural reaction until they were finally still.

            “We need to stop, don’t we?” Myka said.

            Helena’s head lolled back, and she let out a groan that probably had a yes in it somewhere. Myka clambered out of her lap and announced that she was going to brush her teeth. When she came back, her room was empty.


	2. The House of Mirth

            For five whole days, Helena resisted Myka’s timid advances, both at Leena’s and in the random hotel room they shared on a retrieval, and Myka started to understand that she had a problem. Helena seemed unperturbed by the disruption of their new pattern; her only response when Myka asked about it was an affectionate, “I believe we agreed on slow and intermittent, darling.” But the moments when Myka found herself sighing over the flow of Helena’s hair or envying the corner of a page caressed by the woman’s fingers were only getting more frequent.

            When Helena settled into an armchair in the living room to read one evening, Myka informed whoever might be listening that she was going to take a shower. The shower didn’t help.

            She stood in the hallway, wrapped in a towel and dripping on Leena’s carpet, trying to decide what to do. It was too early to go to bed, by at least half an hour, but would anyone really notice she was gone before then? The odds were higher that Pete would notice her squirming in her chair and say something that Helena would overhear. Pete would never believe, even if he cracked a joke about it, that she was really sitting in the middle of the living room thinking about sex. But Helena would know, and she would know who and why and then Myka would have to kill Pete and…

            Pete the ferret chirped and whined when Myka opened her bedroom door, and Myka could have kissed his furry face. Of course. No one could blame her for spending some quality time with her ferret.

            Her brain tangled up into an innuendo about ferrets and beavers and dildos that only half worked in any of the directions it could have gone in, and Myka shut and locked her door.

            She draped her towel across the pillows to keep her wet hair from soaking them through, shoved her teddy bear under the bed, and lay down. The next few minutes were shot through with thoughts like _Maybe I should get my bathrobe out, so I can answer the door really fast if someone needs me_ and _What if I fall asleep and forget to brush my teeth?_ It was almost impossible to make her brain shut up, until she took a chance and let herself remember what Helena’s breast had felt like.

            Cautiously, she started bringing back the images of Helena she had in her mind, innocent and not, zooming in on particular features she loved and touching her own body there. If only she could turn the still memories into a flipbook, something moving, something more alive. Helena’s presence was never still, even when she wasn’t in motion; there was a sense of something orbiting her always, or radiating from her like a solar flare. God, she’d loved looking at photos of solar flares. She’d spent hours pouring over a coffee table book about it, almost panting with wonder, and Myka had endless mental snapshots of her from that day.

            Myka crossed her arms and scratched along the curve of her ribs at either side, as hard as she could. Her hips lurched and her brain short-circuited, whiting out the image of Helena panting over her in bed.

            There were, in Myka’s mind, strict rules about decency and fantasizing. Only one degree of escalation was allowed; imagining what a person would look like entirely naked was inappropriate when they hadn’t yet agreed to let you take off their shirt, for example. Boundaries mattered, and so did the containment of lust. Pressure was too easy to exert when you had let yourself crave what could happen if you pushed your partner just a _little_ further.

            And god, Myka wanted to push Helena, up against a wall, preferably, and pin her hands above her head, sink her teeth into Helena’s neck and Christ, she sounded like a vampire. Myka rolled her eyes and tried to get back to that delicate line she’d been walking, the one where she could pinch her nipple and lick her lips without utterly objectifying HG Wells. Who, of course, would probably laugh if she knew what Myka was dealing with. Quid pro quo, a match for her embarrassing sex story.

            The thought made Myka’s hand stall where it had been combing through her hair. What would Helena care if Myka touched herself and imagined Helena naked? Half of Victorian London had probably done it, and that was a fact Helena enjoyed. As long as Myka kept it to herself, what could it really hurt? Helena would enforce her boundaries when they picked back up with whatever the hell they were doing, and there was nothing in Myka that could possibly defy her. The thought that whatever the hell they were doing might be over flitted past. Myka bit the tender skin of her wrist and ignored it.

            When her hand wandered down between her legs, Myka imagined the look of awe on Helena’s face; the delight of discovery, because even though Helena had done this before, Myka knew every body was different. Her hips rolled upward, trying to get more from her fingers, and she envied the angle Helena could have gotten, how easily she could have pushed inside and truly thrust the way Myka’s body was begging someone to. She could picture Helena, kneeling between her legs, tracing the pattern Myka was drawing on her own vulva, brushing but not quite touching the parts of her that were starting to ache. She would tug one of Helena’s nipples and warn her not to tease.

            Combined with real stimulation, the thought of Helena’s tongue on Myka’s clit was almost too much. Every muscle she had tightened, and she hoped to god it wasn’t one of those nights when her hand got zapped so hard with happy chemicals that it gave out before she could finish. She sat up on her elbow, imagined kissing Helena the way she had before while Helena coaxed her to a slower orgasm than she was actually building up now. The angle was better, at least. She pressed her own fingers inside and pulled back slowly. Her hips wouldn’t stay still, and their thrusting made her hand’s work a bit harder. Images of Helena filled the gaps between what was and what Myka wanted, and all the pleasure that would bring.

            She had worked her way in enough to curl her fingers at the edge of that one glorious spot, and her mind was clinging to every scrap of Helena she had ever known. Her inactive hand clamped onto her bedsheets. She bit back Helena’s name, because that was just a _bit_ too far, and god, this feeling was wonderful.

            The knock on her door almost made her scream.

            “What?”

            “Myka, are you alright?”

            Myka dove off the bed and scrambled for her bathrobe, which she seriously should have set out before she started, what was she even thinking.

            “Helena, yeah, sorry, I just… just a second!”

            By the time she’d covered herself and turned the lock on her door as quietly as possible, as if Helena might not notice, Myka was prepared for the smirk that awaited her in the hallway.

            “Terribly sorry. I hadn’t thought I might be interrupting,” Helena said.

            “It’s fine!” Myka said, trying too late to smooth out her hair. “I was just, you know, playing with Pete, the ferret, I mean, and he got away from me and I didn’t want to open the door until… I… caught him. What did you need?”

            Helena’s grin had only gotten wider. Myka could see her taking a breath, probably to keep from laughing while she answered, “I wanted to return your book, and thank you for the loan.”

            “Right! Great. Thanks,” Myka said. She reached out for the book Helena was holding and realized she’d positioned her hands so it was impossible for Myka to take it without touching her. Myka took as much advantage of the opportunity as possible. Helena’s smile was softer when she looked at her again.

            “Enjoy your night, Myka,” Helena said, and Myka couldn’t decide what she was going to die of first: embarrassment or lust.

 

 

            Three days later, she and Pete flew to Alaska on a mission, and Helena called Myka’s cell phone, just to say hello.

            “Oh my god,” Pete gagged. “What is it with you two? The chain that attaches you at the hip get stretched too far or something?”

            Myka ignored him. An hour into the phone call, he threw a hotel pillow at her and told her to go to bed.

            “I’m looking forward to your coming home,” Helena told her instead of goodbye. “Please be safe.”

 

 

            She was waiting when Myka and Pete pulled up to Leena’s early two mornings after. It was Helena’s day off.

            “Hey you,” Myka called. “Why are you even awake?”

            Helena shrugged and answered, “I was restless, and I thought if you weren’t too exhausted, you might like to stretch your legs. Walk with me?”

            She offered her arm to Myka. Pete, who had been sleeping through most of the drive, mumbled something about breakfast and ambled drowsily inside. Myka slipped her arm through Helena’s, and the two of them set out around the house and down the garden path.

Helena pulsed with an energy that was almost frantic, and she was grinning like she was half asleep. She petted Myka’s hand on her arm. Myka watched her, and every few steps Helena would meet her gaze, open her mouth to speak, but then a smile or a laugh would overwhelm her and she would look away again.

            At the edge of Leena’s property, the neatly trimmed grass and planned-out beds gave way to a field of wildflowers. Helena pulled a blossom of tiny white flowers from the edge of the field and twirled it between her fingers.

            “Do you know what this plant is called, Myka?”

            “It’s carrot weed,” Myka told her.

            Helena batted Myka’s nose with the flowers and scolded, “Queen Anne’s lace! There are so few such lovely things in the world, we should appreciate them to the nth degree. No breath to waste on unappealing names.”

            Myka tugged Helena to a stop and made her look her in the eye. “Are you okay?” she demanded.

            Helena sighed and combed her hair back from her face, dusting pollen from the Queen Anne’s lace like constellations in her hair.

            “I’m tired,” she admitted, “and a bit euphoric.”

            She was quiet for a moment, almost still. The flower twirled automatically in her hand, and she watched it, even as it slipped from her loosening grip. Just when it seemed she would drop it, she mustered strength from somewhere and held the flower out to Myka.

            “You needn’t worry,” Helena assured when Myka took the flower and let go of her arm. “I get like this when I’ve solved a great puzzle. A bit of rest and I’ll be less foolish. This feeling is wonderful, though, being able to see so vividly, truly appreciate the world like I haven’t a care at all. I like to savor it.”

            Myka studied her for a moment. Sam, she realized, got like this, too, in the hour or two after adrenaline stopped pumping. Helena wasn’t usually as open as he had been, wasn’t usually much like him at all, and that was why it felt strange. She smiled, sniffed the flower, and Helena beamed. Myka took her arm again and steered her along the edge of the garden; now was not the time to teach Helena about ticks. Now was a time to enjoy the closeness of Helena, the vividness of her, while the dew soaked the hem of her jeans and the birds started fidgeting in the trees and god, this was stupidly romantic.

            “So what’s the puzzle?” she asked.

            “You.”

            Myka shot her a sideways look, and Helena laughed.

            “I haven’t solved you, of course. A person is an impossible puzzle, but I mean you in relation to myself, you directionally, in the future.” Helena stopped talking, and she looked like she was tapping every word she’d said, making sure it rang as true as it should.

            “And the answer is?” Myka asked, because she figured she understood what Helena meant, even if the words were weird.

            “I want you.”

            And again, Myka stopped dead and stared. “You what?”

            “I’ve missed out on a great deal in my life, Myka. I don’t want to lose the chance to be with you. What I feel, it’s… it’s frightening, because I haven’t felt it in a very long time, and I know how potent such things can be, but I’ve given over so much to fear. I surrendered my work to Charles for fear it would never be read without him, and I’m nothing to history because of it. I surrendered myself to the Regents a century ago because I was so afraid of what I’d done, and I lost all opportunity to do anything.” She looked down at the grass, took a shaking breath, and whispered, “I killed a man for fear of the bronze, and surrendered the last of my innocence.”

            She looked up again, and her eyes were piercing and clear. She took Myka’s hands in her own and insisted, “I can’t, I won’t, surrender what I feel for you.”

            Myka wished she had Helena’s mind, her words, because she couldn’t think of a damn thing to say to that. She looked out across the field of flowers, the sun, the perfection of the morning, and turned back to Helena; scraped through every book she’d ever read and found herself reciting passages from _The Time Machine_ ; couldn’t think of a single time she’d been confronted with such… Well, okay, there was _that._

            “You are,” she said, “an endless wonder.”

            Helena kissed her then, or almost did, a question at the edge of Myka’s lips. Myka pulled Helena close by the hips and answered. When Helena put her hands in Myka’s hair, Myka wrapped her arms around her and shoved aside the thought that, if anyone happened to look out the windows on this side of the B&B, they would get a full view of her French kissing HG Wells. Claudia was probably still asleep, Leena would be in the kitchen, Pete was either eating or in bed, and this was not at all what she wanted to be thinking about. She ran her hands up Helena’s back, and Helena stood a bit on her toes to kiss her harder.

            Myka pulled back and put her forehead against Helena’s, panting and running her fingers through the ends of Helena’s hair. Helena nuzzled into her shoulder, kissed her neck, and asked her what she wanted.

            “You.”

            She felt Helena’s chuckle against her neck. Coaxing Helena to look up with fingers under her chin, Myka kissed her, quick and gentle, and said, “If we’re going to bed, which we don’t have to, we should probably do it before everybody gets up.”

            “Off we go, then!” Helena declared, and she was grinning and marching Myka across the lawn in an instant.

            They tiptoed through the front door, pressed side by side as if their closeness would hide the fact that they were holding hands. Myka checked that the coast was clear between the door and the stairway, then pulled Helena behind her, dashing upstairs in her sneakers and wincing at the clatter of Helena's boots. Helena was choking back laughter.

            Myka chose her room out of habit, but really, it was probably the best choice, because no one would disturb her after a mission. Although, it was Helena’s day off, so maybe they should have used her room, but Myka rolled her eyes at her own fussing, locked the door, and forgot about it. She had Helena by the lapels of her shirt, Helena’s hands were on her ass, and to hell with everything else.

            She kissed what Helena’s shirt exposed, then started tugging buttons loose. Helena pulled Myka’s shirt over her head and nearly tripped over her own button-up trying to back toward the bed. Shoes and socks flew in all directions, and Myka landed maybe a little too heavily on top of Helena when they flung themselves onto the mattress in a tangle. Myka tried to get a hand against Helena’s stomach, because her skin was so soft she wasn’t quite convinced this was real, and she thought maybe feeling the way Helena’s body moved would help. But Helena’s hands were on her back, sliding her undershirt up and away, and Myka needed both of her elbows on the bed to keep from collapsing on top of her again. Myka kissed her harder instead. Helena’s muffled satisfaction gave way to sounds of what she would probably call vexation.

            Her hands pushed and tugged in every direction, and she finally broke the kiss to demand, “How on earth does this bloody garment work?”

            “There’s a bra sewn into it. Here,” Myka explained, sitting up. She pulled it off like an expert and handed it to Helena, who actually examined it instead of just paying attention to her breasts, because god, this woman was wonderful. “Convenient, but not very sexy. Sorry.”

            “Nonsense. You’re wearing it, of course it’s sexy,” Helena mumbled. She flung the shirt aside then and gave Myka a smile that would seduce fruit off a tree. “Now it’s on the floor, and I like it even better.”

            She ran a hand up Myka’s bare side, and Myka shivered. Helena’s palm slid across her ribs, up her sternum, before moving down, and Myka’s heavy breathing brought her breast so easily into Helena’s hand. For a while she was gentle, then she pinched Myka’s nipple, and Myka lurched forward. The rough sensation was like lightning. It was easy then for Helena to push her backward; it would have been easy at that point, Myka admitted to herself, for Helena to do just about anything.

            “You’re beautiful.”

            “And?” Helena raised an eyebrow.

            “And vain,” Myka laughed. “And sexy and are you really going to make me think of words right now?”

            Helena chuckled, leaned over her, and kissed the breast she hadn’t yet touched. Myka pulled her hair, and Helena growled and bit her. That made Myka gasp; lightning again, a bolt straight from Helena’s teeth to her heart, and through her blood to every inch of her. As Helena settled more of her weight over Myka, her hip fell between Myka’s legs. Myka hooked Helena’s leg with her own to hold her there and pressed her hips up, panting at the pressure. Her underwear was slick, and it was easily the tenth pair that had gotten this way since Helena Wells had arrived, but Myka had never been this happy about it.

            Helena kissed her chin and brushed hair out of Myka’s eyes.

            “Do you like this, love?”

            Myka wanted to laugh at that. ‘Like?’ Seriously? But she had lost all interest in words, so she nodded and sat up to kiss Helena. She would like it better, she tried to explain with the push and pull of her hands, if there were more skin on skin.

            When Helena lay down and let her take her full weight, the locket around Helena’s neck dug into Myka’s chest. Every lover branded, with teeth or nails or, in the early days of Myka’s experience, accidental bruises. The four arrows pressing into her now were like Helena’s heart tracing itself out on her skin. For a moment, the whole thing was serious, and sensual, and Myka was gentle with awe.

            “Should we slow down?” Helena asked, and she started to pull away. “Perhaps we should talk awhile, or just…”

            Myka shook her head. “No. If you’re still in, I want it.”

            She dragged her nails up Helena’s back, as reassurance and reignition, and bent her leg at the knee. Helena jerked back into Myka’s thigh when it touched her, trying to maintain the contact while Myka moved it away and back again. There was no more rhythm in the way Helena kissed and licked and nipped at Myka’s breast and ribs. She moved further down, leaving teeth marks in Myka’s side and smoothing them over with her tongue, and Myka let her ride her thigh harder, until all Helena could do was rest her head against Myka’s stomach and moan. The power was dizzying. So was the view.

            Eventually, Helena kicked Myka’s leg down and trailed her hand over Myka’s chest and stomach, stopping with a question in her eyes at the top of Myka’s jeans. Myka bit her own lip and put her hands at Helena’s belt, and the two of them got in each other’s way trying to undo clasps and buttons and zippers. Helena pinned Myka’s hands.

            “Are you going to let me do this or not?” she teased.

            Myka rolled her hips underneath Helena and answered, “Please.”

            In the chaos of taking the rest of each other’s clothes off as fast a possible, Myka found herself on top again. She curled her fingers into the hair between Helena’s legs, then slid further down. Helena moaned into the touch, and Myka leaned forward to be closer to her while she moved. She slid one finger inside, forced her heart not to give out at the feeling, and, at Helena’s pleading, added one more.

            For all that she read, Myka was not a writer, but she had a poet’s need to cross-reference sensations, such that Helena’s skin felt like the matte glaze on freshly fired ceramics, and penetrating Helena was like entering the kiln. She pushed in deeper, and Helena’s hips thrust to meet her. Myka changed the rhythm inside her, just to watch how her movements changed, to see what would make her back arch higher, make her hands fist tighter. When she put her own hips into the motion, Helena moaned through a dazzling smile and dug her nails into Myka’s shoulders. She pulled her close and clung until her back stiffened and her arms went limp, and she fell back on the bed. Myka thrust harder, faster, matching her pace now to Helena’s frantic breathing, and curled her fingers into that spot in Helena that, she’d discovered, made her thrash and growl, and then Helena was coming with her teeth in her fist and Myka watching in awe.

            Myka lay alongside her and kissed her shoulder. Helena rolled her head in Myka’s direction, but no other part of her moved for several minutes. And then she was kissing Myka’s cheek, biting her neck, and her hand was wending its way down between her legs. Myka buried one hand in Helena’s hair, grabbed her ass with the other, and pulled her on top.

            Helena settled herself, propped on her left elbow, and she stopped like that, one hand between Myka’s legs, not quite touching anything yet, and the fingers of her other hand brushing Myka’s cheek. She was smiling. Myka ran a hand through Helena’s hair, but it closed and tugged sharply when Helena moved one finger a little more firmly against her labia.

            In Helena’s workshop, the way she tinkered with the delicate, intimate parts of machines… Myka thought she’d never see human hands more gentle. But she could feel the difference in how Helena was beginning to touch her. There was no end to the tenderness in just the tips of her fingers, and when Myka managed to keep her eyes open and look at Helena’s face, she couldn’t remember the word for more-than-infinite.

            Helena pressed harder against her, almost inside, because Myka was so wet there was no resistance. They both moaned.

            “Oh, you’re a glorious woman,” Helena gasped, and then she was inside, moving in long, deep strokes that were as soothing as they were arousing.

            Myka sighed and reveled in the slow build. It was comfortable and steady, completely undemanding, but it was clear Helena was pulling something vital out of her, each thrust and drag of her fingers like pulling water from a well, hand over hand.

            “God, yes,” Myka said when Helena’s fingers curved up against her.

            “I’m glad you agree,” Helena whispered. “You’re usually so brusque and dismissive of compliments.”

            For a minute, Myka had no idea what Helena was talking about. Then she remembered that Helena had called her a glorious woman, and she struggled up onto her elbows to try and get a good glare in. Helena slowed her hand.

            “Are you,” Myka panted, “making fun of me? Now?”

            Helena leaned forward and kissed her, all sweetness and innocence.

            “I’m making love to you. Do you have complaints?” Helena asked.

            “Well yeah,” Myka whined, and she collapsed back onto the bed. “You stopped.”

            Helena chuckled, and Myka was starting to join her when Helena started moving again. Hard. Myka bucked and dug her nails into Helena’s shoulder; Helena grunted and moved faster. She escalated until the motion was almost wild, made clumsy passes at Myka’s clit, and a white heat made Myka’s palms burn and her legs tingle and dear Jesus fuck.

            She might have said that last part, a little too loud, right into Helena’s ear, because her body lurched so hard she thought she’d bend in half, and she’d taken the opportunity to fling her arms around Helena’s shoulders. Helena’s hand got jammed between them when Myka’s hips pressed into hers, and the two of them were a tangled mess when Myka finally started to ease off.

            Try as she might to hold on to Helena, Myka’s arms went limp and collapsed on the bed beside her. Helena kissed her jaw and started pulling in and out again, slow and long and steady.

            “Should I stop, or would you like a second go at it?”

            Myka nodded lazily, throwing a heavy leg over Helena’s to keep her in place. Helena beamed.

            “You’re delightful. Sit up, darling?”

            Oh god.

            Helena slid inside and pushed toward the head of the bed, coaxing, “Up, up.”

            Myka obeyed as fast as her leaden arms would lift her. Helena kissed the corner of her goofy smile, her neck, her breast, then eased down. There was a wicked smile on her face, and then her tongue stroked Myka’s labia, working from her still-moving fingers and up, gentle and broad at first. When Myka rolled her hips, Helena scratched her with her free hand, then licked more firmly, deeper.

            Helena’s tongue on Myka’s clit sent tingles across Myka’s skin that almost made her go numb, like jumping into water that was way too cold. God, Myka loved that feeling. Gentleness was warm and soothing, and the almost frantic way Helena had taken her before was electrifying, but something about this kind of touch balanced all of that on a knife’s edge. The world snapped into a harder relief, ramped up all her senses at once (What was it Helena had said, about the vividness of euphoria?), and Myka savored the gleam of light in Helena’s hair, the rich browns hidden under what seemed like black. Her hair felt like satin, smooth and fine, just like it looked, but rough in the way it had tangled.

            Helena curled her fingers again, sucked on her clit, and Myka tangled her hair even more by crumpling it in her fist.

            Suddenly, Myka was overwhelmed. It happened sometimes, when the perfection of a moment suddenly burst into meaning. Helena had eased off again, barely brushing her vulva, fingers utterly still inside of her, and Myka scraped Helena’s hair away from her face.

            “Look at me,” she said. “Please.”

            First, Helena wiped her chin, combed her hair aside. Then she rested her head against Myka’s thigh and gazed up at her.

            She looked a little shaken, but something about what she saw on Myka’s face made her smile. Not wicked or cocky or anything else in particular, just a quirk of the lips she didn’t seem able to help. Her hand stroked up from Myka’s hip to her stomach, and she raised an eyebrow.

            Myka took her hand and squeezed. Helena played with Myka’s fingers a moment before kissing her thigh and turning back to what she’d been doing before. She laved over Myka’s clit, twisted her fingers and thrust more deeply, then pulled back to watch Myka break apart.

            “So,” Helena said when she’d stretched out lazily next to Myka, “how is your morning, darling?”

            Myka barked out a laugh that jostled Helena’s head on her shoulder.

            “It’s pretty okay. Yours?”

            “Just grand,” Helena answered.

            And she kissed every one of Myka’s fingers and found a ticklish spot on her side before starting to complain about being hungry and refusing to let Myka get out of bed to do anything about that.

            “Can’t we stay like this all day?” Helena asked, and Myka was ready to insist that, while she’d happily give Helena another round right now, they’d have to get up and eat eventually, and she was on call at the Warehouse, and she should probably take a shower, and…

            And Helena looked so sincere, almost pleading. It might have been just because she was so worn out, but the open defenselessness made Myka protective.

            “We can stay like this as long as you want,” Myka said.

            Helena chuckled and warned her, “Be careful what you offer me, darling.”

            Myka picked Helena’s hand up from her knee and kissed it.

            “Whatever you want.”

            She was so still then. Myka combed her hair back from her face, and she couldn’t tell if Helena was cold or crying or falling asleep.

            “I want,” Helena started.

            A bit of wrangling got the covers up over them both. Myka arranged Helena flat on the bed, lying down beside her. And she waited until Helena spoke again.

            “Don’t let me go. Don’t, don’t let me… please.”

            Myka shushed her gently.

            “Just rest, I’ve got you.”

            Helena shook her head, but her eyes were closed, and the more Myka stroked her back, the slower her breathing became.

            When Pete the ferret chirruped in his cage, Helena giggled (funny little sound). There was sunlight pouring through the lace curtains, throwing shadows on the clothes all over the floor and the waves of Helena under Myka’s bedcovers, still trying to kick sleep away with her restless feet. She was almost panting with the effort, but she managed to lift her head a little and look around her.

And she smiled at what she saw, then smiled again at Myka and kissed her.

            “Such a beautiful day,” she hummed. “Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Do you remember what you said to me once? That you could help me only by loving me?   
> Well—you did love me for a moment; and it helped me. It has always helped me.”
> 
> —Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth


End file.
